Fogazzaro, Antonio

Related Category: Italian Literature: Biographies

(äntô´nyō fōgät-tsä´rō), 1842–1911, Italian novelist and poet. His first work was a verse romance, Miranda (1874). Primarily concerned with moral issues, he was particularly adept at depicting character. His famous novel Malombra (1881, tr. The Woman, 1907) reveals the conflict between the spiritual and the sensual. Piccolo mondo antico (1896, tr. The Patriot, 1906) explores the synthesis of an agnostic wife's moral sense and her husband's deep religious faith; it is considered one of the great Italian novels of the 19th cent. Its sequels were Piccolo mondo moderno (1901, tr. The Sinner, 1907), Il santo (1905, tr. The Saint, 1906), and Leila (1911). Because of their sharp comments on religion and ethics, the last two novels were placed on the Vatican Index, a list of works forbidden to Roman Catholics.